The Explorers Club Washington Group (ECWG) welcomes new members Dr. Catherine Conley FN 07, Mr. Keith Cowing FN 07, Dr. Daniel Gezari FN 07, Dr. Keene Haywood FN 07 and Sarah K. Yeomans FN 07. Chapter events included an April 14th presentation from two of our chapter’s student grant recipients. Benjamin Hutchins, who is a M.S. student in Biology at American University, spoke about his conservation efforts with threatened species of microbes that live in caves. Our other student speaker was Geoffrey Cook who is a Ph.D. student at George Mason University and his topic was environmental threats to coral reef ecosystems. Our chapter’s Exploration and Field Research Grants Program, established in 1997, has been able to awarded $75,300 because of the generosity of our members. On May 5th 80 people turned out to hear Robert E. Hyman, FN 93 and his wife Deborah Atwood give a presentation on their recent Explorers Club flag expedition to Honduras. The Honduran Emerald Conservation Expedition (HECE) documented the most critically endangered bird species in all of Central America and the most endangered hummingbird in the world, living in a valley where it was previously unknown to exist. The habitat of this bird is being threatened by the expansion of agriculture and livestock grazing in the western hemispheres second poorest country. One of our members in the news was James Calderwood Jr. SM 04, son of James Calderwood Senior and Joyce Johnson, FN03. James, who is an Eagle Scout, accomplished the remarkable achievement of earning every single merit badge offered by The Boy Scouts of America, 122 in total! James was featured on the front of the Washington Post Metro section as well as many other newspapers across the country. He appeared on the CBS Morning Show, FOX News Network and was named the ABC “Person of the Week” on World News Tonight with Charles Gibson. James was also interviewed on numerous radio shows including Paul Harvey, NPR and the Canadian Broadcasting Company. Congratulations Jim! Robert Hyman FN 93 recently gave a presentation about The Explorers Club and one of his expeditions to a group at Recreational Equipment Inc. (REI) in Fairfax Virginia. On May 18 and 19 a twenty four hour “Bio-Blitz” of Rock Creek Park in Washington, D.C. was sponsored by The National Park Service and The National Geographic Society. Members from our chapter that participated were Linda Glover FN 97, Keene Haywood FN 07, Robert Hyman FN 93 and Boyd Matson MN 03. Other Explorers Club members in attendance included Suzy Zetkus, Sylvia Earl and Michael Fay.